


Red Pill, Blue Pill

by sprl1199



Category: The Mentalist
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-08-30
Updated: 2010-08-30
Packaged: 2017-10-14 04:03:15
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,013
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/145151
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sprl1199/pseuds/sprl1199
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Written for the Mentalist Ficathon for <a href="http://oroburos69.livejournal.com/profile"><img/></a><a href="http://oroburos69.livejournal.com/"><b>oroburos69</b></a>.</p><p>Rated PG-13 for non-consensual drug use and implications of violence.  </p><p><span class="u">Prompt</span>:  <em>Rigsby and Cho in a bar, undercover because of one of Jane's plots. The rest of the team watching.</em></p>
            </blockquote>





	Red Pill, Blue Pill

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks, as always, to the lovely and talented [](http://finangler.livejournal.com/profile)[ **finangler**](http://finangler.livejournal.com/) for beta!
> 
> Spoilers:  A few vague ones for Cho's past.
> 
> Disclaimer: Not mine, and not for profit!

[Red Pill, Blue Pill]

“This is a stupid plan,” Cho said. Jane responded by pretending to be crestfallen.

“You don’t like it?” he asked plaintively. “I came up with it just for you. You can finally play the role of a heartlessly conniving Triad member.”

Cho leaned back in his chair and gave Jane a long look where he was sprawled on his couch. “Triads are Chinese.”

Jane waved his hand carelessly and turned to lie on his back, feet propped up on the armrest. “I’m sure they would have hired you. You have mad skills that any criminal organization would benefit from.”

Cho kept his eyes steadily focused on the consultant, even though the man was seemingly engrossed in the ceiling.

“It’s a bad idea,” he said levelly, knowing that Jane would pick up on his gravity.

And then ignore it.

Jane shot him his vaguely manic, ‘catch me if you can’ grin. “I think it’ll be fun.”

***

Thirty-six hours later and Cho was stepping into the dim interior of the bar, carefully straightening his dark suit as he peered through the lenses of the designer sunglasses Jane had insisted he wear. He was about to take them off for practicality--dangerous image be damned--when he spotted his suspect alone at a booth in the corner. He was waving energetically.

Pulling in a breath to step into character, Cho headed toward him. Rigsby trailed two steps behind, relegated to the role of bodyguard. Off to his right, Van Pelt sat at the bar clutching her martini glass in fingers that looked a little too tense as she smiled prettily at the bartender.

When Cho reached Mironov, the big man smiled at him and gestured expansively at the empty bench opposite him.

“Please sit,” he said. His thick Russian accent gave Cho flashbacks to Bond films, and he wondered absently which member of his team would be the quintessential femme fatale in this particular plot.

Cho sat, finally removing the ridiculous shades. He nodded businesslike at Mironov.

“Interesting place for a meeting. I had hoped for something more private,” Cho said.

From the corner of his eye he saw Jane enter the bar and smile brightly around him. The man was supposed to be in the surveillance van with Lisbon. _Damnit_.

Mironov was still smiling fixedly at Cho, dark eyes swallowed by his rounded cheeks.

“What is English saying? Pin in haystack?” He waved his hand eloquently and dismissively. “No matter. We are safe here.”

“If you say so,” Cho said evenly. “Are you ready to discuss business?”

“Why such hurry?” Mironov queried innocently. “This is time for acquaintance.” He leaned back slightly in the booth and regarded Cho with interest.

“You work with Shao?”

“Yes,” Cho replied shortly.

“How long?”

“Five years in Los Angeles. One year in the Bay Area.”

“Ahh,” Mironov said smiling. “You were promoted?”

“Something like that,” Cho said, refusing to blink. Out of his peripheral vision he saw that Jane was leaning against the bar and chatting with a waitress standing alone near the end, a charming smile on his face.

Mironov’s eyes flicked up to Rigsby briefly and then back to Cho. His smile took on an edge of satisfaction.

“I did not know Triads recruit Koreans.”

“It’s a tough economy,” Cho said shortly. “Korea offers strong business incentives.”

Mironov threw his head back and laughed.

“I like you,” he said, continuing to grin. Without removing his eyes from Cho, he raised his hand in a hailing gesture. Behind him Cho felt Rigsby tense, but Mironov continued:

“Now we toast new friendship! Is for luck.”

The waitress Jane had been speaking to, no older than twenty-two or twenty-three, walked toward them carrying a bottle of clear, light liquid and two shot glasses. She didn’t make eye contact with Cho or Mironov as she set out the glasses and poured a measure of alcohol into each. When finished, she remained silently fixed in place until Mironov murmured something in Russian and waved her off.

As she disappeared into the small crowd near the entrance, Cho realized that she wasn’t an employee, after all. He made a mental note to ensure Jane relayed her description to Lisbon for their follow up investigation once the sting was over.

Mironov lifted his glass and waited expectantly until Cho had done the same.

He grinned. “ _Za vstraechy_!” he called loudly. “To our meeting!”

He tossed the drink back, and Cho followed after a moment’s hesitation.

Mironov smirked, his eyes dark. “Very good,” he said approvingly.

Cho nodded, the burn of the alcohol lingering in his throat.

“I assumed we’d be having vodka,” he said tightly, refusing to cough.

The Russian laughed heartily. “For me, I prefer grappa.”

Cho regarded him calmly. “You’re not a very good Russian.”

Mironov quirked an eyebrow. “You are not very good Korean.”

Cho didn’t argue. “Now we do business?”

The Russian shook his head. “Is early.“ He slapped the table once vigorously and beamed. “Now we do strip club!”

***

Rigsby’s eyes were slightly too wide in the pulsating, multicolored lights, and his cheeks were showing signs of a blush.

“You alright?” Cho asked quietly from his seat at the table, while Rigsby hovered slightly behind him with his back against the wall.

“Yeah, fine.” Rigsby said faintly, his eyes still trained on the gyrating dancer painted with iridescent snake scales.

“Good,” Cho said evenly. “Because if you don’t take your eyes off the stage and start looking for threats in the crowd, no one is going to believe you’re a bodyguard.”

Rigsby immediately whipped his eyes off the woman, now demonstrating her flexibility with a pole, and began scanning the crowd. “Sorry,” he muttered.

Cho looked down at his Blackberry, continuing his charade as a business-oriented drug lord. He had a text from Jane: **$50 Rigsby gapes openly at stage w/in 10 min.**

“Why are we here?” Rigsby asked uncomfortably, shifting his shoulders in agitation under his jacket. “Do you think he’s trying to lose us? No way drug deals get set up here.”

Cho kept his eyes on his phone. “He won’t lose us. Van Pelt has eyes on him, and we have LEOs standing by ready to respond.”

 **No bet.** He texted back.

Mironov came back into view as he stepped out of the john. Cho could see a flash of vivid red hair beyond him as he wound his way back to their table.

“Ahh,” Mironov said, sinking back into his chair. “Is nice place, yes? Very beautiful women.”

Cho decided enough was enough. The strobe lights and pounding bass were beginning to roil his stomach.

“I didn’t come tonight to see beautiful women. We want to do business with you: your manufacturing, our distribution network. Do you want this opportunity, or am I wasting my time here?” His voice was unexpectedly hoarse, and he tried discreetly to clear his throat.

“You are very dedicated employee,” Mironov said, his tone slightly mocking. He had slung his arm over the back of the chair and looked contrastingly serene in the rowdy environment. One of the rotating lights from the stage bathed him briefly in green, giving his round face a sinister cast.

Cho blinked to clear his vision. The lights were beginning to bleed into one another, morphing into swirls of color. At the same time, the bass-heavy music seemed to be slowing down: each subsequent beat drawn out longer than the last and lingering sluggishly in the air.

It dawned on him that something was wrong.

“You should thank me for helping you, how do you say? Loosen up.”

Cho’s hands began to shake, and he could feel a bead of sweat drip down his temple. He gasped and gripped the arms of his chair tightly as the room began to tilt around him.

Rigsby was clutching his shoulder in concern, calling for backup and paramedics over his wire, but Cho was unable to look away from the man across from him.

“You will enjoy, yes?” Mironov said. “Is not often I am generous with my product.” Leaning closer to Cho his eyes narrowed maliciously. “You are lucky one.”

Cho fell.

 _There were sounds swirling around him, tangible as they brushed across his arms and chest. Memories were taking flight, slamming into him with such force that he was afraid he’d lose his balance and plummet to shatter on the ground._

 _“We got four hostiles on our six! We need cover fire ASAP!”_

 _Cho flailed, reaching for his gun. Where the *fuck* was his tac vest?! His arm was grabbed and he drove his elbow into the midsection of his attacker. Only, when he turned around to follow up with a punch, it was Mrs. Seung behind him._

 _“Hold it gently, Kimball,” she cautioned. “It is very delicate and very old.”_

 _She poured slowly as he focused intently on keeping the cup perfectly balanced in his hands. He could feel the heat of the tea bleeding into his fingers and knew that if he moved even **slightly** the liquid would land on his skin instead._

 _He knew that if it touched him, it wouldn’t be tea at all, but blood._

 _“He was like my brother,” he told her earnestly before being dragged away in a dizzying eddy of images caught out of time._

 _“You’re an unreliable partner,” Jane said as he pulled a coin out of Cho’s ear with flourish. “I nearly got shot.”_

 _“So, I told the professor the evidentiary issues were secondary to the procedural questions,” his girlfriend was saying when the door was kicked in by the insurgents they had been tracking for days. Sand was being whipped harshly through the air by the wind, and the sun beat down painfully on his face.  He was sweating copiously in the heat._

 _“It’s the Ice Man!” David laughed, blood dripping down his chest to draw a smiley face on the apartment floor. “The coldest of us all!“_

 _Elise was screaming as they held her to the ground and struck her, and Cho felt himself coming apart at the seams._

 _“Please forgive me!” he whispered in Korean. “I’m so sorry.”_

 _Everything went black._

When he came to himself again he was exhausted and shivering, even though he could feel that his shirt was plastered to his back with sweat. Someone was soothingly rubbing from the crown of his head down to his shoulders, and he realized he had his eyes closed tightly. He forced them open and ordered his whirling brain to catalogue his current situation.

He was on his knees collapsed into a bush, with his fingers digging painfully into a well-manicured lawn. After a moment he recognized the lawyer's office that was situated somewhat ironically behind the strip club.

His breathing was uneven and gasping in his ringing ears, and he grimly tried to force himself to steady.  He felt dizzy and sick, memories still exploding like fireworks in his mind.

Every time he’d tried to fall asleep the last few months, the image behind his eyes would be of Elise, bruised and bloody on the apartment floor and him _powerless_ to do anything to stop the who animals held her down.

Or the image would be of David, dead in the gutter.

He was seeing them now as the surging of his stomach finally got the better of him, and he vomited, taking grim satisfaction in the thought that he was purging at least a little of whatever he’d been slipped.

Though he was no longer hallucinating, it was apparent the drug was still merrily riding his blood stream, as his mouth seemed to open then without his permission.

“It was you,” he rasped, trying to focus his blurry eyes on the smear of gold and blue to his right that he knew must be Jane. “They were hurt because of you.”

It wasn’t actually what he wanted to say, and didn‘t reference either the specific tragedies whose images he couldn‘t escape nor the person that he actually held responsible. But it came out regardless, the words hovering between them. Were Cho still hallucinating, he imagined he would have been able to see them there.

Beside him, Jane flinched and went pale, freezing for an instant before resuming his gentle petting of Cho’s hair. His smile, ghastly though it was no doubt meant to be reassuring, did absolutely nothing to cloak the agony in his eyes.

“I know,“ he said simply. Cho dazedly looked back down to where his hands had apparently been clenching compulsively in the grass. There was dirt under his fingernails, and his knuckles looked bruised. He wondered disconnectedly if he had hit anybody in the club.

A pair of large shoes appeared in his field of vision. The socks were each a slightly different shade of brown where they were showing under the suit.

“The EMTs are 2 minutes out,” Rigsby said, voice low. “They’re requesting we move him closer to the parking lot.”

“Right-ho,” Jane said. “Ready to try those legs again, Cho?” The man hadn’t ceased carding his fingers gently through the hair at Cho’s temple, and he wondered vaguely if he was being hypnotized.

Apparently Jane’s question was rhetorical, because a moment after asking, the consultant pulled Cho’s arm over his shoulder and stood, Rigsby gripping his other arm to steady him. His head swiveled loosely around during the change in position. He must have looked fairly green, because Rigsby glanced nervously down at his suit and increased the distance between their bodies. His left eye was swollen and beginning to bruise.

“Sorry,” Cho said. Somehow it came out in the Korean of his childhood, and Rigsby looked even more concerned.

Jane stood pressed closely to Cho, their bodies aligning from ankle to shoulder. He patted Cho’s hand where it rested on his shoulder. “I’m sure he knows,” he said, beginning to move toward the parking lot. Cho lurched awkwardly in his wake as Rigsby trailed slightly behind them, large hand still clutched around Cho’s bicep.

The parking lot was flooded with black and whites, awash with lights flashing in a dizzying array of red and blue. Cho closed his eyes, feeling his nausea resurge.

He focused on the sounds of the officers at work around him containing the scene, grounding himself in the police codes and law enforcement jargon.

“Mironov?” he croaked, suddenly remembering their suspect.

“He slipped out during the confusion,” Rigsby replied. “But we have his accomplice from the bar. We think she was the one who slipped the drug into your drink. She might have information on his bolt holes.”

He didn’t sound very confident, and Cho grunted.

“I think this little episode will be enough to make him leave the country for awhile,” Jane said. “He can be someone else’s problem.”

He turned to look directly at Cho. “But when he finally returns to California, he’ll know our vengeance.“ From most people the statement would have sounded absurdly melodramatic, but Cho knew there was iron resolve behind it, despite Jane’s mild tone. It gave him a bizarre measure of comfort.

“Absolutely,” Rigsby agreed. “Tonight has sucked.”

Cho felt his lips quirk in a smile. His shaking was starting to abate as his teammates' conjoined warmth leached into him.

The ambulance pulled up then, and he was handed off to the paramedics who immediately bundled him into the back and began taking his vitals.

He listened to the drone of their conversation and allowed himself to doze.

***

When he woke next it was with a mouth of cotton, a pounding headache, and the smell of antiseptic in his nostrils.

“You’re in the hospital,” Jane said quietly from his right. “The drug is out of your system, but they’re keeping you overnight for observation.”

He was sitting slouched in a chair next to Cho’s bed, a book closed beside him with a cup of steaming tea set on top of it.

Jane pushed a button to raise the head of the bed and allow Cho to sit upright, afterward pressing a glass of cool water into his hand.

“Thanks,” Cho whispered, throat parched. His arm felt like an overstretched rubber band, and Jane had to help him steady the glass while he drank.

The room was quiet and dimly lit, and Cho realized it must be extremely late at night. He didn’t question how Jane had managed to stay past visiting hours.

“It wasn’t your fault,” Cho said into the silence, leaving the statement open to Jane’s interpretation. His memory of the evening wasn’t particularly lucid, but he had the feeling he might owe the other man an apology of some sort.

Or maybe not. With Jane, it was always difficult to tell.

Jane smiled faintly. “It was, actually,” he said. “Mironov noticed you and Rigsby watching me in the bar, and he implemented his backup plan. It was very clever of him. I think we underestimated his cunning.”

“Drug lords aren’t cunning,” Cho replied, glad to fall back into their customary back and forth. “Super villains are cunning. Drug lords are just paranoid and well-funded.”

Jane hummed, neither agreeing nor disagreeing.

“Get some rest,” he said. “Rigsby and VanPelt were making plans for us all to go out for breakfast in the morning once you’re released. If we play it right, Lisbon will pay for it.”

Cho decided rest was an excellent suggestion; his eyes were feeling heavier by the second.

“It’s your turn to buy,” he said with a yawn as he lay the bed back down and closed his eyes.

“That would deny Lisbon a chance to assuage the guilt she’s no doubt feeling even though nothing that happened was within her control,” he heard Jane reply. “Let the woman buy you some waffles, Cho.”

Cho was too tired to respond, but he resolved on insisting Jane pay the tip in the morning. A hefty one.

He fell asleep to the sounds of his teammate flipping through the pages of his book, the scent of tea lingering in the air and guarding his dreams.  



End file.
